


4 Blocks Whitehall

by conaquo



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ministry Employees, Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Department of Mysteries, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:16:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 4,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28260768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/conaquo/pseuds/conaquo
Summary: Harry Potter respectfully requests that all missives be delivered to him in the quill-written word. Via owls, the nice non-magical way, because the talking heads inside the fireplace unsettle him.Bin your howlers, Malfoy.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Kudos: 12





	1. Mark on History

**Author's Note:**

> As all great things are wont to do, this story started off inside a New Message window and grew.
> 
> Updated every Sunday.

Potter,

Saw the ridiculous memo you sent out to everyone. ‘Bin your howlers’, really? I couldn't help but notice that that particular catch was added on afterwards – can only assume you took the time to single out my note, attached the line, and then proceeded to tie it to the legs of the single most battered-looking owl that I have ever had the misfortune of laying eyes upon. I briefly thought of reporting you to Granger’s new anti-cruelty thing that she christened last week - was it P.U.K.E.? - but thought it bad form to force her into the position of having to furlough her publicity officer, especially when he was one of her only two members, so restrained myself. Be grateful.

Anyways, this paper thing you’ve forced us all to resort to is INANE – not that I’m very frequently thrust into the position of having to contact you, seeing as the Unspeakables are (thankfully) yet to be submitted under the supreme and all-encompassing rule of the DMLE. However, as everybody else is apparently much too snowblinded by your hideous tees ~~and eyes~~ to be able to breathe unfavourable words in your face, I thought it my duty to bear the brunt of the cross and inform you of this highly antagonistic opinion that the general public no doubt wishes to express. That _is_ how you use the expression, isn’t it?

Congratulations on getting me to actually use the stationary they assigned me at the beginning of this job. Feel free to rest in peace now that you’ve finally succeeded in making your mark on history.

\--

Draco Lucius Malfoy  
Unspeakable, Department of Mysteries A910  
F: Draco Malfoy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS is the type of hideous shirt that Harry wears (minus the Chemistry, because this is Wizarding London and nobody knows what Argon is).


	2. Up for Negotiation

Draco,

Aww, you read the memo! I was worried that most of them were headed straight for the fireplaces – but if _you_ read it, then I really can rest in peace with the knowledge that they at least didn’t immediately get cobbed over everyone else’s heads.

I accept no constructive criticism because everything about this decision is constructive (and no, that decision isn’t up for negotiation, either). My request for simple pen-on-paper memos has greatly increased the amount of information that people now feel comfortable just sending me, instead of having to accost me in the hallways or shove their faces in my dusty Floo because they feel awkward doing the former. I guess it’s just nicer to be able to dictate a message to your quill instead of having to stick your head in the fireplace to have to verbally address your boss – I used to do it with Robards, and hell if they weren’t some of the most awkward briefing sessions I’ve had to sit through in my entire life (That’s quite a high bar to top, considering that I had Snape sit across the table from me and talk to Dumbledore about my effective-immediate expulsion multiple times – and the time I blew up that bridge last year. That was bad).

In fact, my decision was such an excellent one that Hermione says she’s sending out her version of The Request tomorrow morning – so now this thing is Hermione-approved, too. Be prepared with your DoM-customized messenger pads at the ready.

Nice idea for the stationary, by the way. I’m going to have a set made for my PA. Hopefully, having his title stamped on the bottom of hundreds of paper rectangles will remind him to actually do his job once in a while, instead of bunking off the Ministry’s dime and taking advantage of the break room tea packets.

On the subject of my tees – how did you even see them? I reserve all tee-wearing hours for when I’m not exposed to the eyes of polite (not that you often are) company. Not because of the uniform policy – I checked, we don’t have one of those – but because some of the people that populate this building don’t merit the pleasures of seeing the stuff that's written on them and laugh – it's comedy gold! And they’re not _hideous_ , rather the textile embodiments of peak comedy and humour.

Sincerely,

\-- H

PS) Yes, that’s how you use it.


	3. Keeping up with Witch Weekly

Potter,

Just got the memo from Granger – SHE used the sickly owl, too. Does it remind you people too much of Weasley to not keep it around and have it shed feathers on your desks, or something? I mean, I imagine yours is already enough of a travesty that the added clutter of a few feathers would have no impact upon the overall landscape, but Granger’s office is a whole other matter. I’ve never been before, but reality seems always to exceed the imagination when it comes to her and her working habits – fully expecting to see 30+ tabs of cross-referenced material that she found a loophole in the Ministry’s admittedly sketchy codes to be able to enter into legal partnership with. At least that seems to me to be an infinitely better and more plausible option that choosing to align herself with Weasley, of all people.

I always thought she ~~was dating you~~ went more for the types with perpetually messy hair and _Witch Weekly_ smile nominations under their belt, although Weasley rises to the first prerequisite with aplomb, I’ll have to admit.

Excuse me for the eye-opener, Potter, but that _one_ time you oh-so-happened to blow up a bridge? I have it on good authority that you were the chief perpetrator of the incident at Vauxhall last month, which included three bridges and at least one antiquated muggle omnibus according to the reports that the (adequately traumatized) Junior Unspeakables filed. Don’t tell me you believed for even a moment that the rumors regarding your notoriously zero-to-nil regard for the places you run headlong into were endemic to the _terra firma_ of the DMLE? I mean, you have an entire wing named after you in the spell damage ward, you have no idea how much the mediwitches like it when a namesake celebrity comes along every other month, all beaten up and concussed.

Plus, the ministry’s wall-to-wall gossip fraternities are much more effective than Floo-heads and even the quill-written word. Nothing stays hush-hush for more than the time it takes for the hags at Accounting to accrue in the break rooms and horribly distort it.

About your PA, I’m honestly surprised that he’d be willing to exhibit such a sad lack of attitude in the position of playing personal assistant to the supreme overlord of the known universe, seeing as your ~~setting of the example~~ foolhardiness generally seems to inspire the poor souls around you to slave away even harder in retrospect. I’ve asked after him to one of the sacred members of the PA gossip chain and she says none of her various and multiple tentacles have detected any disturbances – actually, the fellow hasn’t ever come around to any of the Friday bashes they throw at the Bassoon, down by what’s-his-name’s old war office. She refused to give me a name, though, and I’ve been all tangled up in laying out regulations for another one of those quasi-nuclear bombs that the twin Weasleys cooked up last month so didn’t have time to drop by the DMLE and have a look for myself. I _will_ get his name sooner or later, so you might as well just tell me. Actually, let me remedy that right now – am ripping off another page from this ridiculous pad and owling HR for his file. Until then, any way the message could be delivered to him in a more upfront way than a wrapped, tied, and thoughtfully chosen gift?

Speaking of gifts, there’s a tailor I know downtown that does both custom and alterations to ready-mades on relatively short notice. I owled him and he said he’d leave all four to six slots vacant on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday vacant for the next three weeks – consider dropping by and spending about two hours standing around while he does you a number, and maybe do dinner afterwards at one of the restaurants nearby. ~~I know you wouldn’t~~ ~~It’s okay if~~ Please consider it a pre-holiday indulgence for myself, as the prospect of no longer having to suffer for a prolonged period of time at the hands of your shockingly terrible shirt-jokes is more than joyous enough to spark some grade-A seasonal cheer in even the darkest dredges of my Slytherin heart.

That, and upon the (highly likely) event that you get fired from your current position for driving others to spares with your fantastically awful fashion choices, you’ll always need something nice to clean up at the job interviews. I’m still convinced they only gave you this one because they were too distracted by ~~your eyes~~ the birds flying out of your nested hair.

I take back what I said about there being minimal need on my part to contact you in my first letter – bad karma, or something.

\--

Draco Lucius Malfoy  
Unspeakable, Department of Mysteries A910  
F: Draco Malfoy


	4. Chapter 4

Draco,

Hermione’s decision to marry Ron isn’t even remotely close to the worst decisions in _alignment_ she’s made over the years – see how she decided to keep company with me, for starters. And Hermione’s office? Are you kidding me? That place is a teetering mancave constructed out of the ashes of MACUSA notaries that write the months and dates backwards and only maintaining its structural balance with the aid of several strategically placed Sharpies at key locations. She clearly hasn’t invited you over for tea because she’s worried the ceiling will give out and concuss you – she cares about you like that, see, the rest of us had to have Mexican takeout under the crosswords section of the north wall. I think Ron permanently burritoed the three-letter word for ‘drops on the ground’.

Regarding my PA, my list of creative and innovative methods to motivate him before the monthly reviews come around has been run dry. Glad to see that the PA gossip chain pledges anonymity to its members, even to Draco Malfoy and his ~~wiles~~ notoriously amazing flat whites. We need that kind of backhanded allegiance in the ministry where all forms of nepotism and outdated bigotry run rampant. Give my three cheers to whoever the lady may be.

On a slightly more serious note, please don’t feel the need to string my PA up by the ceiling of his mouth and make lacerations over his tendons until he caves and decides to stop squirreling the tea. Okay, I realize that writing that out makes it sound like it isn’t serious at all, but I’m keeping it there as you probably aren’t above (or below) such acts of violence and in all honesty, if I actually came upon you doing that anyways I’d be grossly tempted to help out and then use my powers as supreme overlord of the known universe (your words, not mine) to get us bailed from Azkaban. I’d be very grateful if you aided me in my exercising some modicum of restraint, please.

Clothes-shopping? Really? Unless the excitement has effectively laid waste to my cognitive abilities in deciphering the English language, I think Draco Malfoy just offered me a holiday gift – obviously, that letter merits a place very close to my heart on the inside of my cunningly hilarious tee-shirt. No on the clothes, please, I’m not that kind of Ministry high-up who has all his winter things custom made on Saville Row.

The dinner suggestion sounds much more promising. Does the offer still stand? I’m refusing to show my face at Gringotts at the moment, so anywhere adequately priced would do.

\-- H

PS) Supreme overlord of only the ‘known’ universe? Disappointed you only think so little of me.

PPS) I think the building you were trying to refer to is the Old War Office of Winston Churchill, the former Muggle Prime Minister who held office during the time of George VI and who was also more informally known as one of former Minister Leonard Spencer-Moon’s closest friends.

Are you sure the PAs hold their to-dos in the Bassoon, though? I suppose it’s all right if you’re into that sort of upscale scene, but the Corinthia London is hardly the place to try and get as flat-out drunk and messy as you can on a Friday evening off margaritas and sake bombs (which is what I assume those tawdry soirees are naturally meant to achieve).


	5. Finally, Work

Potter,

~~are you seriously fucking asking me~~

~~are you fucking~~

~~are you allowing me to take you out on a~~

This letter will not be a part of this (frankly ridiculous) chain of arguments -- which I am clearly gaining the upper hand on, let's face it -- that we are having, but will actually be a missive addressed from a member of the Department of Mysteries to the Head of the DMLE, for whom the following content holds some relevance. Believe it or not, I find that this ridiculous letter is preferable to having to appear in your office in the form of a green head in the fireplace that I know you still haven’t managed to barricade properly ~~except for the fact that I can't see you in person~~.

Apparently, there’s been a moderate fluctuation in the wolfsbane trade with Poland and they’ve chalked it up to a budget problem with transportation across borders – see Appendix 6 in the file attached for information on shared long-distance portkey locations in Germany. It doesn’t merit much commentary except for the fact that there’s been a recent breakthrough in one of the labs in Krakow about how to reverse the creation of wolfsbane using a new type of magically aided distillation, meaning that some of the rare ingredients being used to craft it, primarily aconite, will be able to be retrieved from the finished formulae. In case your hatred of Severus manifested itself in you refusing to tune into his lectures about one of the most important potions that we had to study in order to pass our N.E.W.T.s with a semi-acceptable score, wolfsbane has a really shitty shelf date and it goes bad about 17 hours after being taken off the heat, obviously the idea of being able to retrieve the ingredients before a batch goes sour would be appealing. They’d go public with the method to help boost sales, but the issue with that is that the majority of commercialized wolfsbane in the market contains some extremely purified crystals of magic-engineered narcotics. All of which can be used to create some forms of street drugs and therefore very valuable to several of the cartels that stretch out across Scandinavia and several parts of Central Europe – you see where this is headed, right?

We’ve never really dealt with the Wizarding-Muggle narcotics trade before, but I understand that it’s in Kingsley’s agenda to expand the sector of the Aurors’ International Cooperation (hence all the hair-tearing Granger’s been doing) and so we’ve decided to include it in the weekly department heads’ briefings. Which means I will be seeing you there.

Bring a quill, I fully expect that you will be taking notes.

\--

Draco Lucius Malfoy  
Unspeakable, Department of Mysteries A910  
F: Draco Malfoy

p.s. Granger’s office, a mess? I don’t believe it – photographical evidence is in order.

p.p.s. No. Simply. No. Potter, your pranks -- including the truly awful tidbits that your shirts exhibit from time to time -- have gone too far this time. Please tell me you don't mean to say you've never been to the Wizarding Bassoon - the favourite haunt of the ghosts of several legendary ministry wizards, most popular choice of employees' alcohol consumption in the entirety of Whitehall? Holds no relation to the muggle cocktail bar named the same thing, where, by the way, I've been -- can't hold a Guinness to the Wizarding one, I swear.

Look, Potter, this is just a matter of putting two and two together, see? Think of the Leaky -- for Muggles, not only is the Wizarding Leaky absolutely spellotaped with notice-me-not spells, there's also a sad-looking haunt named the 'Leaky Boot' that stands in its place. Apparently it's big with the folks who work in the video shop right next to it -- drinking on the job, universal indicator of shitty job performance for both muggles and wizards. Like the Leaky, all Wizarding bars that are located in muggle London have a muggle version of them, so to speak, and the Bassoon is just one of the better ones -- where yes, the objective is to get extremely drunk in an extremely short amount of time, to answer your question.

Surprised that you've had to guess that, actually. It's like you've never stood in a ministry Friday party before -- it's pandemonium compressed into the space of a few square metres, populated sparsely with stools that are extremely easy to slide off of once the level of inebriation passes a certain marker and with regretful choices galore that'd probably sell stories of 'I've Slept With the Saviour!' to Skeeter once you let them go after morning coffee.

You do let them go with coffee, don't you? I usually make a point of booting them out during the night, but I feel like you're the type of do-gooder arsehole who supplies every you-were-much-more-attractive-with-kamikaze-shots regret with brunch and an autograph before they're free to traipse back into the wild, where they will then proceed to die sad and single because they have been ruined by your extreme coital proficiencies.

p.p.p.s ~~you~~ ~~you really~~ Trying to bum a free meal off of me, Potter?

It worked. Specify location and time, location will be subject to change if your tastes are too plebeian for me to stomach.


	6. p.p.p.p.s (It just gets ridiculous at this point)

p.p.p.p.s -- it's just getting ridiculous at this point and I've scoured the archives for an hour but nothing's coming up, so here goes -- refusing to show your face at Gringotts? Curious. I thought they'd lifted that ban on you and the Weasleys (it physically pains me to write that) years ago, after you fully compensated them for the broken ceilings and the illegally trafficked dragon. Aside from the fact that you bear an uncanny resemblance to goblins, any reason why you'd be avoiding Gringotts? Bad memories? PTSD?

Actually, not PTSD. Last mandated therapy records date back to two years ago.

So what is it?

p.p.p.p.p.s Your employee photo is hideous, by the way.


	7. Lauren Makes an Appearance.

Draco,

Looking forward to seeing you at the briefing. I won’t be bringing a quill, but I do send out a meeting-wide memo about all points of discussion about half an hour after adjourning, so keep an eye out for that and be sure to forward me any issues. On top of that, I now know what to get you for Christmas – it has as of two p.m. today been booked and yellow-starred in my Amazon shopping cart.

I’ll also make a special effort to wear one of my best shirts under the uniform. I hope you’ll consider yourself flattered, I always feel like one of those penguins in NatGeo walking around with that many layers wrapped around my generous love handle.

I never knew that was the case with Wizarding and muggle bars. (The Leaky Boot sounds fascinating, any chance we can have our dinner there?) Truth is, I’m not ever really invited to these scenes – I mean, Draco, I’m a decade younger than most of the people I work with. I don’t have kids, I’m a bit too young to be prematurely balding, and everybody knows I haven’t enough hours in the day to have time to be pulling a Christian Grey in my basement while managing not to get myself fired by sleeping on the job. People like the photos and they trust me to work the job at a scene, they get angry at me when I do rash things and they (hopefully) respect me as a coworker, but that’s about where the line lies. I guess it makes for something of an awkward scene when your boss is doing karaoke with a pint when you’re there to gossip about his latest scandals on the _Prophet_ , probably? Again, never really been to one of these things, so this is all just pure speculation. Is it terribly sordid? For some reason, I think of the Slytherin common room when people mention these things. Does Lauren from Sports and Entertainment let down her hair? If so, is it true that she grows cloves of garlic inside her bun and regularly feeds it with alcohol?

The last party I’ve been to, somebody tried to assassinate Kingsley and my face went cover page on at least five major newspapers across the European continent.

On a similar note, I’ve… never actually gone on ~~that many~~ any one-night stands. So I’m genuinely lost as to what the answer to your (vaguely inappropriate for a work correspondence, but let’s face it, this is long past the maginot line of coworkerly vendetta at this point) question would be. Would I be the type to just leave them stranded on the side of a street with their heads in paper bags so they won’t be forever traumatized with alcohol-blurred memories of the worst sex they’ve ever engaged in? Probably not. But am I sure? Hardly.

Actually, I think I’d just let them out the door after tea and toast. And then maybe toggle with my Floo settings for a bit because there’s a slim chance they might’ve been assassins who decided to lock down on the coordinates of my house using the most time-consuming and painstaking method known to humankind – the honeypot.

Regarding my Gringotts issue – seriously, you don’t know? I’d attach a copy of the relevant article here, since only this morning somebody mailed one to me that was wrapped inside a booby-trapped thong, but Astor immediately threw it in the fire. Despite the fact that spells cannot be damaged by fires (of which there were none in the fireplace, because yes, even though I haven’t managed to barricade properly – where do you get this stuff? – I did extinguish the Floo a few weeks ago.) Where it then promptly proceeded to blow up half of the office and set my favourite shirt on fire, so yes. It seems you won’t be getting your hands on _that_ particular edition of last week’s paper.

If you want to know, one of the paps photographed me at Gringotts talking to Bill about having the kids over to my house for the weekend. Only of course, taking photos in Gringotts is highly illegal (I don’t even know how they managed it, re-doing the security for weeks afterwards was a fucking nightmare) and the French embassy contacted Finance two hours after print release and inquired after the fate of the La Trennie rubies – which they’d presumed had been lost or destroyed in the midst of the 5th or 6th goblinese civil war, but had in fact just been stolen by Alvarr the Atrocious and squirreled away in Gringotts for the next 400 years. Which a goblin was caught weighing somewhere behind my left shoulder in the shot (my head looks perfectly fine in that photo, by the way, so thank you for your disparaging comments). Sometimes I think it must be humanely possible for me to do appallingly mundane things like run a bank errand, but then. Life is full of potholes and surprises.

Right, since we’ve (finally) touched upon that subject, which on hindsight I probably should've addressed a lot quicker and also with more urgency-slash-aggressiveness. Why on earth – working myself up for a pen rant, can you see the letters getting uglier? – would you be pillaging around in the employee records? How do you even have the access?

All right, dumb question, rant is over since I wasn’t even that angry in the first place – I probably am supposed to be sending a squad of Auror SWAT teams crashing through your window right now, looking for evidence of document contamination, but I’m too lazy to sound the call. Also, extremely curious: how _do_ you find your way around the Ministry filing system so easily? For someone who’s supposed to be the master of the invisibility cloak, my document footprints are far heavier than should be.

\--

I was planning on sending this off three hours ago, but duty called and Errol was busy playing dead in the corner of Ron’s office. Quick question – what are your feelings about the Auror Operation Protocols?

I’m asking because I know the DoM had a hand in their establishment during Gambol, and I’m thinking of a complete renovation of them as the first project of my term. Most of Act 5 was written even before the Aurors were official and the Acts regarding emergency backup protocols – the ones that matter most when it comes to field action – are sometimes so riddled over with ridiculously obtuse addendums that they have to adjourn court for hours at a time in Wizengamot hearings to determine the correct ruling if one of the parties decides to invoke to them on the floor.

Of course, there’s the issue to consider that I’m barely one-thirds into my first month as Department Head and that this isn’t the first time someone has taken the issue up with the board. They’ve always scheduled it as second or third priority each time my predecessors brought it up, but it’s the kind of preparatory work that doesn’t really grab the eye of the media and for that reason alone, I can think of more than ten key executive members that would be against undertaking it as a long-term project.

What do you think?

\-- H


End file.
